"The central point that emerges from our research is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy," they write, "while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence."
~ Princeton Study: U.S. No Longer An Actual Democracy[22] by Brendan James

– 1 –
Modern Tyranny Recast as Epic Science Fiction

The Wachowskis' newest extravaganza, Jupiter Ascending[23], is – like their 1999 The Matrix[24] – built around a passionate and humane message that highlights abuse of the masses by a power elite, and does so in a wildly entertaining and imaginative way.

In The Matrix, the premise is that mankind has been imprisoned in a carefully-crafted dreamworld. This false world has been created by intelligent machines solely for the machines' benefit. Neo (Keanu Reeves), the protagonist of The Matrix, terrifies the machines because he threatens to show mankind what the machines don't want people to see: that humanity has been literally enslaved by means of an illusion broadcast into people's minds.

One suspects our real-life power elite were not thrilled with The Matrix, especially given its commercial success.

The Matrix was a surprise hit – a box-office phenomenon with a worldwide gross of over $463 million, not adjusted for inflation, from a production budget of only $63 million. The two sequels, The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions, brought in almost $1.2 billion. The Matrix also became the best-selling DVD of all time.*

* I couldn't find a source for DVD sales numbers on the web, but physicist Andrew Thomas makes this claim on page 118 of Hidden in Plain Sight 4: The Uncertain Universe[25], in a discussion of the limitations of what we can know about reality – another example of the reach this film has had. The box-office and production budget figures above are from BoxOfficeMojo.com[26].

The Wachowski siblings put the idea that the elite control the masses by means of a pervasive and carefully-designed web of lies into wide public discourse. It wasn't a new idea, but the Wachowskis popularized it and thrust the topic of systematic information- and opinion-control into the foreground. There were too many points of similarity between the Wachowskis' fictional Matrix and the cruelty and mendacity of our real-world corporatist[27] elite (corporations and government acting together in corrupt, mutual self-interest) for audiences to ignore. The topic also leaked out to millions who never saw the film but read or heard discussions of it, on and off the web.

If The Matrix was a slap in the face to the power elite, Jupiter Ascending is an outright indictment of those with vast wealth but stunted empathy who benefit from schemes that involve cruelty or death to millions of human beings. One thinks of the bloated military arms industry[28] (here's a modern update[29]), of Big Pharma[30] (don't miss the “What drugs really cost” chart), of the cancer industry[31], of the militarized War on Drug Users, of the dictatorial FDA[32] (“sorry, terminal cancer/heart disease/diabetic/other patients, better you should die in agony than try a medicine we haven't approved yet”) or of the federal government generally (“Which pipsqueak country shall we bomb into rubble or invade next?”) or the mendaciously-named Federal[33]Reserve[34] (“Counterfeiters R Us” would at least be descriptive and would certainly be more entertaining) or – well, any of a hundred modern institutions, agencies, and government-connected corporations.

Jupiter Ascending takes the current situation and jacks it up to bizarre, mythic proportions (as did The Matrix). In the new film, the Earth, along with thousands of other worlds, is a farm owned by a single hyper-wealthy family from another star system. (Tellingly, these people are royalty AND business tycoons). Earth will be harvested – yes, that will involve killing every person on the planet – when the population reaches a certain level. The harvested human bodies are distilled into a life-extending elixir that can keep people alive and youthful indefinitely. About a hundred human bodies yield a single quart(ish) container of the elixir; the truly rich bathe in pools of the stuff.

Earth will be ready for harvest in mere decades, although its owner (Balem Abrasax – a depraved Eddie Redmayne[35], winner of this year's Best Actor Academy Award for his portrayal of Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything[36]) tells an employee “I will harvest that planet tomorrow before I let [Jupiter Jones] take it from me.” Jupiter (Mila Kunis) is the genetic duplicate – a “recurrence” – of Balem's deceased mother (whom he murdered long ago), which makes Jupiter the newly-discovered heir to Earth. Balem wants to kill Jupiter because losing title to Earth before it can be harvested would put a serious dent in his portfolio.

Of course, murdering the population of entire planets to obtain longer life for the rich sounds bad, but Balem sets Jupiter straight on the issue: “Every society is a pyramid, and some lives will always matter more than others,” he tells her. “It is better to accept this than to pretend it isn't true.”

Clearly, many of today's power elite subscribe to Balem's world-view – including especially many who advocate socialism and other alleged help for the masses; pretending concern for commoners is a terrific disguise for these people (Balem's younger brother Titus [Douglas Booth[37]] is in this camp; he claims concern for his “subjects” only as part of a scheme to wrest Earth away from Jupiter so that he can harvest the planet). In real life, the rich favor socialism (of the left or the right) because it directs more of the people's wealth and power into the hands of government, which means into the control of the rich and their corporations, foundations, and allies in and out of government.

– 2 –
Cast and Canvas

Andy and Lana Wachowski go beyond showing us how evil and avaricious the psychopathic coercive elite can be; the real power and backbone of this story is the healthy, natural behavior of the two lead characters, the titular Jupiter Jones and Tatum Channing[38]'s Caine Wise.

Readers will already know Jupiter's basic story line (or see here[39] for a summary). The film starts by introducing us to Jupiter Jones and her closely-knit extended Russian immigrant family (actress Mila Kunis actually IS an immigrant from the USSR[40], BTW), which makes a living cleaning houses for the wealthy in Chicago. The story soon shifts to Caine Wise, an off-world former military man with some wolf-like DNA spliced into his genome, who, while tracking down a young woman, is attacked by a group of bounty hunters looking for the same person. A fight ensues with both sides using almost magical advanced-tech weapons and tools including a one-woman sky-cycle[41] with invisibility cloaking. The perfectly-rendered effects, well-written and acted characters, and nicely choreographed and edited action are dazzling. Even at this early point in the film, it is clear the Wachowskis intend Jupiter Ascending to be at the top of the “serious action-science-fiction” genre. This continues throughout the film, which shows the Wachowskis' growth as directors and screenwriters as much as it showcases the 16 years of special effects progress since The Matrix won awards for [42]its[42] effects work[42]. (It also won, in addition to four Oscars, Best Direction and Best Science Fiction Film at the 23rd Annual Saturn Awards).

Some reviewers were taken aback by all the genetic tinkering in Jupiter, with many characters seeming to incorporate genetic material from rats, owls, deer, even elephants. But with companies like Ginkgo Bioworks[43] already designing and selling synthetic biology for a variety of uses from perfume to biofuel, it seems clear that a few thousand years of scientific advancement – should humans survive that long – would bring truly stunning results in the area of genetic engineering. For that matter all the advanced tech on display in Jupiter, like Caine's hand-held energy battle shield or the “gravity boots” he sky-surfs on, puts one in mind of Arthur C. Clark's famous dictum that “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Most of the movie's tech does seem grounded in advanced theoretical physics and other disciplines (wormhole gates and control of gravity waves, for example) rather than simply made up without any potential foundation in reality. If you're a techie, a SciFi geek, or a science enthusiast – or just haven't completely lost your childhood sense of wonder – Jupiter Ascending should be a real treat; it certainly was for me.

The visuals are surely stunning – this is a gorgeous film, whether the action is happening in Chicago or somewhere off-world. I don't want to leave out Michael Giacchino's score[44], either, which is fabulous – fully on par with the best from John Williams[45] (Star Wars and many other award-winning scores) and the late John Barry[46] (Dances with Wolves, for instance). In their zeal to insult every aspect of Jupiter Ascending, trolls[47] have made snide comments about the score (for instance, about the use of a choir), but if you are a fan of soundtracks, this one is worth checking out.

– 3 –
Not Your Grandmother's Cinderella

Word from the Troll Brigade is that Mila Kunis' Jupiter Jones is a pitiful, helpless, retro-Disney princess. Like so much that has been written about Jupiter Ascending, this is flatly untrue. Ms. Jones begins the story, once again, as part of a hard-working Russian immigrant family, but is soon staggered to learn that (A) strange alien beings are on Earth, (B) most of them are trying to kill her, and (C) an attractive man with pointy ears has rescued her and given her some mind-blowing detail about the universe. He has also confirmed that the alien assassins will keep coming for her until they succeed. Jupiter is stunned by all this (wouldn't you be?) and the situation rapidly gets even stranger, with Jupiter being taken to more than one alien planet and introduced to a Machiavellian royal family whose members are trying to deceive her or even kill her. Yet she handles it all quite well – better than most people would, certainly. She also fights when necessary; before the film is over, Jupiter has kneed Balem in the crotch as he is strangling her, shot him in the leg, and taken a metal bar he had hit her in the back with and slammed it into his back and then whipped him in the face with it. She refuses to kill (or to let Caine kill, in one instance) the bad guys, but she is certainly willing and able to defend herself. A helpless bit of fluff she is not.

– 4 –
Contrast and Character

If the Abrasax heirs (Balem, Titus, and sister Kalique) and their callous minions show us polished, cold-hearted psychopathology, Jupiter Jones and Caine Wise remind us of the better parts of our nature: both characters are warm, genuine, empathic, brave, and flawed but never evil or malicious.

Tatum Channing has been knocked as being too restrained here, but Caine is a former soldier who would seem out of character if he were more visibly emotional, not to mention that Eddie Redmayne's Balem projects enough emotional drama for the entire cast. You will recall that Caine's genome was spliced with some canine DNA, and it turns out that he has had to live without a pack. “Alone, usually they waste away and die”, Sean Bean[48]'s character Stinger tells Jupiter. This canine element in Caine, combined with his longed-for connection to a pack or family – subtly yet powerfully suggested by Channing – adds a quiet impact to his character and to the growing relationship between Caine and Jupiter, and for that matter to the relationship between Caine and Stinger (Sean Bean is excellent in the role and – Bean fans rejoice – his character is still alive at the end of the movie).

Positive, healthy human characters form the contrast that brings the twisted, sick nature of the power elite into even sharper focus here. Every major and minor character aligned with Jupiter or Caine, including Captain Tsing (Nikki Amuka-Bird[49]) and other Aegis members (“They're like cops,” says Caine. “Space cops, sure” mutters Jupiter), is as direct, honest, and decent as you'd want your own friends, family, and colleagues to be.

Indeed, the most powerful special effect in the film, for me, was Jupiter's apparently effortless decision to leave the vast wealth and near-immortality of the position she has inherited and not merely return to Earth, but return to her family in the situation they had been in before Jupiter's adventures began. Jupiter still (secretly) owns the Earth – which is why it won't ever be “harvested” – but has chosen, at least for now, to not live as “an entitled”, as the elite are called in off-world society.

It would not be surprising if the violent events, the malicious and deceitful characters, and the generally shallow, ostentatious, and corrupt culture that Jupiter has been exposed to had increased her appreciation for her own warm, loving, and honest family. And it is certainly no surprise that she and Caine end the film as a couple, because Caine's decency, courage, and loyalty to those he cares about make him a perfect fit for a woman of similar qualities – unlike the “entitled” class generally (which Caine despises), Jupiter is not corrupt, avaricious, or cruel – she is the opposite, a genuinely warm person. But still: to walk away from near-eternal youth and to, at the very least, put such stunning wealth into the background in favor of family and the modest circumstances that helped create the character of that family – THAT is stunning. Kunis' Jupiter Jones makes it seem the natural and obvious choice, but a month after seeing this film for the first time, I am still rocked by the path Jupiter chooses at the end.

Not many films extol family, honest friendship, and simple human decency as strongly while ALSO making clear the danger of corporatism to human life. Jupiter Ascending is exceptional in this regard, and marks the return of the Wachowskis to Matrix-like themes in a big-budget SciFi adventure – one with a potentially huge audience (in addition to The Matrix, think Avatar or for that matter Star Wars – both of which slammed the power elite).

It would hardly be surprising, then, if some part of the corporatist establishment decided to push back to blunt the reach and impact of this film. For that matter, it would not be surprising if pro-coercion members of both the establishment and the casual (mostly Internet) media had much the same reaction against this film that so many have shown recently against, for example, libertarian, or at least not left-wing, science fiction [51]books[51].

I believe both of those things actually occurred; that a campaign was orchestrated against this film, augmented by a collection of politically-motivated individual responses – and that, to a large extent, the combination was successful. Jupiter Ascending's audience was far below expectations, especially in the United States[52], and the many snarky reviews (not just “negative,” but emotionally harsh and contemptuous) and torrent of astonishingly rude comments about the film planted everywhere Jupiter is so much as mentioned are, I believe, the main reasons why.

To be clear, that is theory, not fact, despite the (mostly indirect) evidence for it, a smidgeon of which I cover below. And I acknowledge there is no way to know how much better Jupiter might have done at the box office without the tsunami of trollish commentary that was unleashed against it; perhaps I am unusual in finding Jupiter Ascending as enjoyable and compelling as the films of The Matrix trilogy, but my bet would be that the campaign to slam Jupiter cut viewership dramatically and cost Warner Brothers Studios many millions of dollars.

It's not as if there aren't endless examples of malicious campaigns to shape public opinion in one way or another. False flag attacks[53] have been used since ancient times to provide excuses and support for war and for repressive policies at home – and let's not gloss over this because false flags are literally mass murder committed for money and power. Books, pamphlets, newspapers, and then newer forms of media have been used to sway opinion for and against any number of things, with frequent pro-war propaganda (old[54] and new[55]) being perhaps the best known examples. Individuals and small groups have conducted dishonest and troll-like campaigns against writers, researchers, and ideas that the individuals or groups disagree with or feel threatened by; Steven Pinker discusses some examples in The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature[56]; Alice Dreger found herself entangled in a firestorm of this nature while working on material that became Galileo's Middle Finger: Heretics, Activists, and [57]the Search for Justice in Science[57]. It is known that modern governments and other groups have used systematic trolling[58], character assassination[59], online poll manipulation, and other Internet tricks to influence public opinion, to block information, and to destroy a target's reputation, among other things. For example:

“The secretive British spy agency GCHQ has developed covert tools to seed the internet with false information, including the ability to manipulate the results of online polls, artificially inflate pageview counts on web sites, “amplif[y]” sanctioned messages on YouTube, and censor video content judged to be 'extremist.' The capabilities [are] detailed in documents provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden . . . .”
~ Hacking Online Polls and Other Ways British Spies Seek to Control the Internet[60], by Glenn Greenwald

Not a stretch, then, to think that much of the troll-ish, mean-spirited commentary about Jupiter Ascending on almost every website that mentions the film might be (A) part of a hard-nosed, centralized campaign and (B) partly an effort by individuals to put deceitful, negative thoughts and opinions (i.e., comments crafted to have a negative effect as opposed to honest and genuine commentary about the film and the reviewer's reaction to it) into play in the minds of the movie-going public before they'd actually seen the film – and to help guide their opinions in negative directions even AFTER they'd seen it.

Yes, reading nasty comments about something before you encounter it can actually shape your perception when you DO encounter it. Humans are genetically primed to take emotionally harsh negative remarks seriously; when someone expresses disgust, loathing, or contempt for someone or something, it is difficult to keep that opinion from coloring our own feelings and judgement about that person or thing. This has been understood since ancient times: talking about your opponent with disgust in your voice is far more effective than rationally arguing against his or her position. Feeling trumps thinking almost every time.

There’s a new study that corroborates the very “soul-killing, society-destroying effects” of vile Internet comments. According to George Mason University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, online rudeness and gross, negative comments have the power to influence the opinion of otherwise objective readers. The researchers staged a phony news blog and posted a fake story on a fictional tech called Nanosilver. The article, which included both positive potential and negative risks, was put in front of participants in one of two ways: One version had supportive or polite comments, and the other was rife with trolls blasting obscenities and attacks at other commenters.

. . . The participants weren’t overly affected by civil comments, maintaining whatever their original opinion was of the new, “breakthrough” technology. But the group exposed to the uncivil comments were more divided, more likely to change their perceptions and prone to focusing on the negative aspects of Nanosilver.

In other words, the rudeness was infectious and influential . . . .

What’s worse is that, apart from the outliers or trolls, this effect could be hindering an entire generation of people from thinking for themselves. Writer Meghan Daum’s op-ed in the L.A. Times struck me as sad, mostly because it has a ring of truth:

“When I talk to students or young writers about the importance of being unafraid to take controversial positions, I’m struck by the degree to which they can’t entertain a thought, much less commit one to paper, without imagining the cacophony of snark they’ll get in response.” [END of excerpt; emphasis added]

Imagine a world in which pro-freedom, pro-compassion, anti-authoritarian films like The Matrix or Jupiter Ascending are systematically and relentlessly destroyed before they have a chance to develop an audience – sneered at in reviews on corporate-sponsored or government-influenced websites (apparently word went out that Jupiter should be called a “hot mess[62]” – or perhaps lots of reviewers just independently decided to use this phrase in discussing the film . . .) and buried under vicious global troll campaigns to ensure that no one sees the film without first having their opinion of it poisoned. Imagine a world where individual reviewers and the staff of many websites feel it natural and sensible to slant the review of a book or film based on the message evident in the text or on-screen regardless of the quality of the content. Soon enough, studios would get the message and stop investing money in films, especially, that were sure to be systematically crushed before they could turn a profit.

I don't think we have to imagine such a world, and I expect to see more of these psychopathic[63] troll campaigns against any film that might awaken audiences to the evil character and horrific actions and effects of the coercive, corporatist elite. That's just simple “opinion management,” folks, and governments, corporations, and NGOs (non-government organizations) have the means (conventional and automated troll attacks, ever-more powerful computer hardware and software, and in some cases direct control or influence over media content), the motive (desire to suppress anything that calls attention to their crimes, “legal” or otherwise), and abundant opportunity afforded by the Internet itself. And with entire generations now having grown up immersed in coercive-collectivist propaganda and apparently having learned that honesty is irrelevant as long as collectivist ideals are served, any systematic opinion-management campaign gains the added power of some portion of mainstream opinion, especially within the media and academia, already being on the side of the elites (while those same rubes are thinking that the collectivist ideas and policies are “for everyone's benefit”).

Ultimately, meaning perhaps “already” given how quickly tech is moving, killing any film or other source with an “undesirable” message will not only be simple to do: it will be automatic, with the widespread collectivist opinion of reviewers and media owners augmenting computerized action initiated and carried out (including writing the text[65] of troll comments or even reviews) by ever-vigilant narrow-focus AI systems constantly scanning the net for “opinion threats” and then taking action based on prior programming.

I would replace Chomsky's “the US establishment” with “the coercive elite globally” because our corporate/regulatory/surveillance/ police-state regime here in the United States is only the best-known and (probably) largest player in the effort to control information and opinion on the Net and elsewhere worldwide.

The good news is that more and more people understand this problem and many are working to do something about it. Many sites have posted anti-troll policies; comment moderators (“mods”) are removing rude or threatening comments from threads; several types of anti-troll software have been or are being written (here's one[67] just released that aims to fix the problem for people on Twitter), and so on. Spreading knowledge of the problem will, by itself, improve the situation as people learn to identify trolling and to discount it rather than be hurt or (as strongly) influenced by it.

Over a number of years, we’ve found that the most effective way to fight disruption and disinformation is to link to a post such as this one which rounds up disruption techniques, and then to cite the disinfo technique you think is being used.
~ How to Beat Internet Trolls[47], by WashingtonsBlog

But clearly, defensive tools and techniques are limited. Many troll methods, including posting misinformation in an otherwise civil manner, manipulating online poll results or pageview counts, and outright removal or censoring of targeted content – these last requiring large organizations or sophisticated hacking ability – are almost impossible to address, at least for now. But at least the situation is being talked about and understanding of it is spreading.

– 6 –
Fighting Back for Love and Freedom, While We Still Can

A lifetime ago, in the 1960s and 1970s, I thought the forces of good and evil were fairly balanced in the world. The U.S. anti-war movement actually got Congress to defund the war in Vietnam, stopping the slaughter in 1975[68], and racism and other thoughtless or malicious attitudes and policies were under sustained attack, mostly but not entirely by the Baby Boom generation. It seemed possible to me that things could go either way: either good or evil could gain the upper hand and become dominant.

I was wrong, partly because my opinion was based too much on surface appearances. It now seems clear to me that the ascendancy of evil – at least for a time and perhaps for all time – became almost inevitable in 1913 with the creation of the U.S. federal income tax and the “we print money from nothing” Federal Reserve: virtually ALL of America's wealth has by now been diverted into corporatist hands (again: government and government-connected corporations and other groups) by means of those two epic forms of theft. For that matter, in Timeline of a World-Killing Paradigm Shift[69] I made the case that adoption of the U.S. Constitution (which replaced the more libertarian Articles of Confederation[70]) began a train of events moving us toward a global, civilization-killing catastrophe. Evil has not merely won; it has essentially killed the Earth. We've alreadykilled much of the Pacific[71] (worth reading in full – and in the year and a half since that was published, one epic die-off after another[72] has been reported in and around the Pacific – sea birds, whales, sea lions, salmon, starfish, sardines, krill – you name it).

You're thinking that this piece has gotten darker than expected. It's certainly darker than I originally intended, but sometimes we need to go where the material takes us. Sometimes we need to wake up and see things as they are.

I could be wrong; we might be on the cusp of a global awakening that will see mankind insist on love, freedom, and simple human decency in place of the cruelty, tyranny, and corruption[73] that increasingly characterize society throughout much of the world. Perhaps something will make it possible for this healthier viewpoint to overcome the massive structures already in place to restrain it; maybe the concentration of most of the planet's wealth and power in the hands of a small number of Abrasax-like “entitled” individuals won't actually prevent the emergence of a more free and compassionate world. Maybe I'm just not seeing what is in front of my face.

That seems unlikely, but again, I might be missing something. I really hope I am.

Certainly, some percentage of the world population is waking up to what is happening, to why it is happening, and most importantly, turning away from the idea of coercive, centralized control. This awakening is too little and too late, I believe, but people are coming to understand the Non-Aggression Principle[74]. I am not the only person to have noticed the trend:

Consider the philosophical – the moral – significance of this. Of the principle that’s been – so to speak – smuggled into people’s minds. It is a resurfacing of the old American ideal: He ain’t bothering you. Leave him alone. The importance of this cannot be overemphasized.

Because it scales.

If one accepts in principle that it’s no crime – though perhaps a vice – for adults to smoke pot or to engage in various consensual sexual acts – then it is only a matter of time before that principle begins to be applied to other things. It is the critical first step toward conscious acceptance of the Non-Aggression Principle (NAP), the moral idea that using violence against peaceful people is always wrong.
~ You Say You Want a Revolution[75] by Erik Peters [Emphasis in original]

In the absence of a major economic, social, and political upheaval, including a crackdown on “terrorists” (i.e., anyone who so much as talks about the truth, or who otherwise opposes the current corruption and tyranny and might be the tiniest threat to the coming expansion of that tyranny) – then I would expect this widespread awakening to eventually win the day.

But why would the coercive elite allow that to happen? Wouldn't they have planned for such an eventuality? We have to assume they don't want to be stripped of their stolen wealth and imprisoned or hanged. Surely they've made ready for the inevitable Great Awakening, when things have gotten so bad for so many that all the propaganda in the world can no longer hold back the truth – in the Internet age, especially.

If you've been watching what the Empire has been doing lately to marginalize, criminalize, and thwart the Rebel Alliance (returning to movie tropes; tip of the hat to George Lucas), and especially if you've taken time to pull back and see the vast, relentless sweep of the Empire's action for the past century and more – the building of centralized structures, the creation and build-up of occupying forces, the slow but non-stop pro-coercion (“socialist”) shift in what is taught in schools and in the media, the pseudo-legal frameworks (Patriot Act, John Warner Defense Authorization Act[76], etc. ad nauseam) constructed to support not merely corruption and tyranny but even martial law, total surveillance, treating citizens as “enemy combatants”[77] on little or no evidence, and much more (pseudo-legal because these frameworks violate the Constitution and any other even slightly pro-freedom, pro-human-rights institution or convention you can think of) – if you have the long sweep of this growing tyranny in view, then the situation looks far more dire: it looks like this (Terrorist Alert: Government Extremists Threaten Americans[78]) or, even more disturbingly, like this (Jade Helm is Tightening the Noose Around America's Neck[79]). It looks like an approaching genocide (democide[80], technically) against “domestic terrorists,” a planned economic and banking crash with taxpayers, savers, investors, and retirees making the elitist banks “whole,” a major increase in day-to-day police-state tyranny, and other horrors aimed at finishing what the coercive, globalist elite started long ago: the assembly of a structure with total control for them and poverty-stricken servitude for everyone else – at least, for those who survive the coming, engineered cataclysm.

Whether I am right or not about there having been a campaign aimed at limiting the viewership and impact of Jupiter Ascending, the far more important question is: Are the real-world elite about to trigger a long- and carefully-planned phase shift in the Western world, a shift in which a great many will die and many more will find themselves in those Haliburton-built “detention camps” from 2006[77] – threatened by the various laws allowing for indefinite detention (without Habeas Corpus or respect for other rights) and for execution without trial or evidence, and by executive orders[81] (among other things) that allow – just because a President said so! – the feds to confiscate land, resources, and human labor simply by decree in response to whatever the government deems an emergency.

At this point, I believe the most important thing people can do to stop (or perhaps slow or soften) all this is to simply spread the word about it: open the eyes of as many people as you can, because it is a certainty that those planning and preparing to implement the epic crimes implied in all those horrific preparations are planning to tell the world a very different story about what happened and what the causes were. They plan to hide the most damning of their actions and to convince the survivors and the rest of the world that they, the establishment, were reacting to forces and events outside of their control and that they did the best they could to care for “their subjects” in difficult times. They do NOT want the public to know that for decades, they planned and carefully implemented the draining of America's wealth, the steady replacement of liberty with tyranny, and eventually the arrest, detention, and in many cases execution of dissidents – i.e., those who actively opposed the transformation of the United States into a version of North Korea. The armed and trained government agents who carry out this end-game violence (and others involved with the preparations for it) are likely headed for the same fate not much later, as those at the top will not want testimony or armed resistance from people who know what really happened – some of whom WILL be shocked and angered by the dark transformation of the country that they and their families live in.

So spread the word; help others to stop ignoring the stunning and dangerous preparations for treating much of the public as “terrorists” and for erasing any vestige of America's heritage of liberty. Your freedom and possibly even your life depend upon it.